Sense-making, drawn by hand








01 — Complexity
Sense-making Complexity
Policy documents don’t change minds — pictures of icebergs do. I turn the complicated stuff into one honest cartoon that everyone can point at.
Environmental policy cartoons · Educator research
02 — Alignment
Sense-making Alignment
A group that shares a picture shares a direction. Gatherings, visual language and metaphor — so everyone means the same thing by the same words.
Community gatherings · Visual language & metaphor


03 — The Moment
Sense-making the Moment
Some conversations are too good to lose. I capture the thinking in the room while it happens — so the moment leaves with everyone in it.
Live capture · Fishbowl · Sketchnotes
04 — Workshops
Sense-making Workshops
The pens end up in your hands, not mine. Zine-making, cartooning, and honest conversations about how sense gets made.
Zine making · Cartooning · Talking about sense-making


Hello! I’m Bryan Mathers.
Sense-making is my creative process: we talk properly about what you’re trying to say, I sketch ten ways in, and together we find the gold — usually somewhere unexpected. Then I draw it, so it does the explaining for you.
From the project blog
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